Month: October 2020

Britain believes that the vaccine, which Pfizer is co-developing with Germany’s BioNTech SE , could be ready to distribute before Christmas, the report said. Pfizer’s Chief Executive Albert Bourla has previously said the company could release data on whether or not the vaccine works as early as this month. The U.S. drugmaker said this week if trials are successful the company expects to file for emergency authorization of the vaccine candidate from U.S. regulators shortly after it has enough safety data in late November. …read more […]

Remdesivir brought in $873 million in the quarter, below analysts’ estimates of $960 million, according to Refinitiv IBES data. Gilead Chief Commercial Officer Johanna Mercier said that although the United States saw a surge in COVID-19 cases over the summer, many were younger people and hospitalization rates actually dropped. “Our assumption is in light of the surge this fall both in Europe and the U.S., those numbers will pop back up,” she said. …read more […]

(Bloomberg) — For fragile oil markets, the outcome of next week’s U.S. election poses yet another risk: the prospect that major producer Iran may regain its role in international trade.Challenger Joe Biden, leading in most polls, has signaled he’ll seek to bring Iran back into the 2015 nuclear accord the U.S. brokered when he was vice president under Barack Obama. That means the economic sanctions President Donald Trump imposed — and tightened further this week — could eventually be eased, opening the sluices for more than 2 million barrels a day of Iranian crude exports.The timing for the oil market …read more […]

More dilution could be on the way for beleaguered shareholders of Aurora Cannabis (ACB). The company gave note of a preliminary prospectus, which over the next 25 months authorizes the Canadian cannabis player to issue up to US$500 million in securities. The prospectus also noted exhaustion of the company’s ATM, through which it has raised gross proceeds of US$214.7 million since its fiscal fourth quarter.Aurora might have all sorts of issues, but it is an expert at issuing shares. Over the past 6 years, the share count has increased by almost 9,250%.Jefferies analyst Owen Bennett is not surprised by the …read more […]

(Bloomberg) — Taiwan’s United Microelectronics Corp. pledged “substantial assistance” to the U.S. in a high-profile trade-secrets prosecution of Chinese chipmaker Fujian Jinhua Integrated Circuit Co.UMC pleaded guilty Wednesday in San Francisco federal court in a deal with U.S. prosecutors, who agreed to drop serious charges of economic espionage and conspiracy for the alleged theft of proprietary information from Idaho-based Micron Technology Inc. UMC instead admitted to trade-secret theft and agreed to pay a $60 million fine.The guilty plea resolves one piece of a complicated, international prosecution of an allegedly illegal transfer of Micron’s memory design in a chip manufacturing deal …read more […]

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(Bloomberg) — U.S. stock futures climbed as investors looked for positive catalysts after concern over coronavirus infections and tougher lockdowns Wednesday spurred the market’s worst decline in more than four months.S&P 500 futures contracts expiring in December were up 1% as of 10:41 a.m. in Tokyo. Contracts on the Nasdaq 100 rose 0.8% while those on the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 1%.The S&P 500 Index fell 3.5% Wednesday, the biggest drop since June 11, amid a surge in Covid-19 hospitalizations, especially in the Midwest. European stocks also tumbled, as France imposed a new nationwide lockdown and Germany moved to …read more […]

The chief executive of Nvidia Corp said his planned acquisition of Arm from SoftBank Group Corp cost an “arm and a leg,” but that the chip designer’s valuable network of customers made it worthwhile. Japanese tech conglomerate SoftBank announced in September it would sell Arm to U.S. chip designer Nvidia for $40 billion as it builds a cash pile through asset disposal. “I had to pay you an arm and a leg for it,” Jensen Huang told SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son in a pre-recorded conversation at annual conference SoftBank World. …read more […]

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Exxon Mobil Corp on Wednesday kept its fourth-quarter dividend flat at 87 cents a share, signaling 2020 will be the first year since 1982 that the U.S. oil producer has not raised its shareholder payout. Exxon this year has pledged deep cost and jobs cuts that could be announced as early as Friday, and the decision to hold the dividend stable could indicate it expects the cost-cutting will allow it to continue making the hefty payout. At $3.48 per share, the annual dividend is equal to 10.6% of its share price. …read more […]

(Bloomberg) — Exxon Mobil Corp. is maintaining the third-highest dividend in the S&P 500 Index, underscoring its historic commitment to the payout despite this year’s virus-driven oil crash.Investors will be paid 87 cents a share for the current quarter, matching the level of the last six periods, the Irving, Texas-based company said in a statement. The oil giant trails only Microsoft Corp. and AT&T Inc. among S&P 500 companies in payouts to shareholders over the past 12 months, according to Bloomberg data.The plunge in crude prices and demand for petroleum products caused by the pandemic sent shock waves through the …read more […]

Stock futures opened slightly higher Wednesday evening after the three major indices endured a deep rout during the regular session. …read more […]

(Bloomberg) — It’s a fool’s errand trying to find an election signal in a stock market roiled by a global pandemic, but investors will take any edge they can get. One such indicator is flashing a warning for Donald Trump’s chances on Nov. 3.The sharp equities selloff over the past few days doesn’t bode well for the incumbent party, if history is any guide. Since 1928, the S&P 500’s performance in the three months leading up to the presidential election has correctly signaled who will win 20 out of 23 times, according to data compiled by Strategas Research Partners LLC. …read more […]